Thoughts on the Ubuntu Mobile and Embedded Project

In light of Canonical Ltd.'s recent update of the Ubuntu Mobile and Embedded (UME) architecture roadmap, following last month's announcement of the project by CTO Matt Zimmerman observers should be served notice of the dawn of Ubuntu as viable Linux platform. This particular mobile and embedded endeavor rounds out Ubuntu's presence in desktop and server environments by extending the Ubuntu brand into the unwired arena. Even if it's too early to grasp what UME will and won't be able to do, it suffices to say that a growth opportunity does exist.

The Mobile and Embedded edition will power the user experience for Intel’s 2008 Mobile Internet Device (MID) platform. Initially Ubuntu will feed off interest in UME within the walls of its development community, but it will be intriguing to observe how well (if at all) this momentum carries forward outside those boundaries. Doing so within the context of the mobile and embedded application domain won't exactly prove to be a slam dunk...this is an area still waiting for an open source effort of this nature to trail blaze a path to disruptive success.

Yet even as Canonical takes steps toward expanding the Ubuntu brand, it is still well known for being the Linux distro with the quirky names, a quite popular Linux distro, but a distro nonetheless. Fit with quality desktop and server editions, it's not just users but also tech reviewers who have spoken praise of Mark Shuttleworth's brainchild. And I, like a great deal of others, am high on Ubuntu's chances to succeed as the first Linux desktop suited for mass markets across the globe. Not to ignore the potential for growth on the mobile/embedded and server side, but I'm of the perspective that those will ultimately benefit from the significant uptake driven by Ubuntu on the desktop.

In the same vein, throughout the process of maintaining its status as a popular, easy-to-use Linux desktop distro I also see Ubuntu emerging as the platform of choice for an expanding segment of application developers that are/will be targeting the Linux desktop. While Red Hat's Enterprise Linux continues to establish footing within organizations in the market for a Linux desktop solution, Ubuntu has the opportunity to become the it platform for reaching what is already a growing majority, the non-enterprise user outside the western world. Applications which can run on Ubuntu will be able to, by relation, leverage the distro's traction and extensive worldwide community distribution channels. Perhaps we're not too far from product managers having the following inner monologue: Runs on Windows...check, runs on Mac...check, runs on Ubuntu...check.

Accordingly, I expect that as demand for IT assets mirrors the growth taking place in emerging nations and is coupled with the steady progress towards open standards there (opening the playing field to all types of open source in general), Ubuntu will be in the eye of a nearly perfect storm. The Dell partnership stands as just the beginning. The demand for a freely available, open source desktop alternative capable of supporting the average user is rising. Demand for one that enables migration to Linux but doesn't entail relinquishing the use of core applications and functional ease of use, is already a reality. Most importantly, all of this is bigger than any backlash against Microsoft (or any other market leader for that matter) the trend is proving to be a manifestation of the thirst for choice.